Here we have some of the other books that have been top-sellers in Pakistan.

The Taliban Code: The Langda Don, on sabbatical at Rawalpandi University, tries to uncover the greatest secret the world has ever known, namely that behind the apparent misogyny the Taliban is actually an army of ultra-feminists headed by Mullah Greer codenamed “Haseena Atim Bum“.

There is something about cricketers, something about “ball misses bat bat misses ball howazzat” that just make those lips go out of control. I first came to know of this relationship between cricket and kissing during the Sportsworld quiz when the quizmaster asked “Who was the first Indian cricketer to get kissed on a cricket field” and the answer I found out was Abbas Ali Baig (One of the teams guessed Bapu Nadkarni to which the quizmaster pointedly said “Do you want me to repeat the question”?).

Whether you find Quentin Tarantino an arrogant, over-rated prick raised to stratospheric levels by the worship of his zombie fanboys or whether you consider him Hollywood’s most stylish and original visionary, the main reason for either assessment is essentially the same.

And that is that Quentin Tarantino’s movies are about one and only one thing.

High school. History period. Sitting in the front bench a friend said to me, a bit loudly and with barely concealed exasperation “What is the use of this stuff?” Our history teacher, in an unusually good mood, turned to him and rather than boxing his ears pointed to the book, ” Everything you see in today’s news has its origins right here. This is also where all today’s news will ultimately land up.”

I am sure all of us, at some time or the other, have sat contemplating why so-and-so, possessing such moderate talent have achieved so much in life. While we , infinitely superior in all respects have been able to achieve little in comparison. After much envious sadness and introspection, we have come to the conclusion that when opportunity came knocking so-and-so went for the ball in a fashion we felt was shameless–blowing their horn, elbowing the rest—something which even we could have done if we were as desperate. Not that occupying the dubious moral high ground has caused us any satisfaction over the years. Far from it.

However what whiners call shamelessness, winners call aggressiveness. It is a trait possessed by few. To make the most of opportunities. No matter if that makes them look opportunistic. After all, they are too busy being successful to notice the hushed whispers and the roll of eyes.

In the 70s and early 80s, directors like Manmohan Desai perfected what came to be known as the Hindi movie formula—–big-multicasters with larger-than-life heroes, chawanni-flinging dialogs, black-and-white linear stories with strong moral messages, elaborate expositions that allowed one to miss thirty minutes of the movie at any time and still be able to follow it once he came back, eye-patched white-suit wearing villains, ever-sacrificing “Nirupa Roy” mothers, epic running times so that even if one did not quite enjoy the movie, one could get 3 hours 20 minutes of shut-eye in a cool air-conditioned theater.

The late 80s and the 90s saw a transformation in this well-accepted standard template, one that was caused by a change in audience tastes. Movies that slavishly followed the older formula, for instance Amitabh Bachchan’s so-called comeback series of movies, were rejected and many of the older movie moguls faded away. Barjatiya-Chopra-Johar became the standard-holders for the new formula namely that of NRI romances targeted towards the international market which were defined by drastic improvements in production quality, foreign locales, family values, syrupy love stories and Manish Malhotra costumes.